On 1 April 2020, NHS South East London Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) was established. The new CCG is made up of the previous six south east London CCGs in Bexley, Bromley, Greenwich, Lambeth, Lewisham and Southwark. Information that has been held previously by those six CCGs transferred to the new CCG on 1 April 2020. The new CCG will become the new controller for the data held by the superseded organisations. If you have any further questions about the use of data by NHS SEL CCG, please contact nelcsu.information-governance@nhs.net.

Equality and diversity

The importance of equality and diversity to Bromley CCG

As an organisation which buys and monitors health services for the people of Bromley, we are committed to ensuring that all of our processes (both for commissioning and as an employer) eliminate discrimination and treat everyone with fairness, respect, equality, dignity and autonomy.

These principles are incorporated into everyday practice, policies and procedures so that promoting equality and diversity is a key characteristic of the whole organisation.

We ensure that our actions and working practices meet with the spirit and intention of the Human Rights Act (1998) and the Equality Act (2010) which consolidates existing equality legislation for these protected characteristics:

age

disability

gender reassignment

marriage and civil partnerships

pregnancy and maternity

race

religion or belief

sex (male or female)

sexual orientation

The Equality Act sets out the public sector equality duty. The duty requires public bodies to have due regard for the need to:

eliminate unfair and unlawful discrimination

advance equality of opportunity

foster good relations

We integrate equality and diversity into our policy development, service delivery and employment practices through our equality objectives, which are:

reducing inequalities is core commissioning business

empowered, engaged and well supported staff

improved access to healthcare for vulnerable groups

Engagement with the community in Bromley

We are committed to engaging with all parts of our local community to inform our commissioning work. We try to ensure that our participation activity reaches diverse communities and groups with distinct health needs and those who experience difficulties accessing health services and people who have characteristics that are protected under the Equality Act 2010. Our engagement with the local community is informed by equality impact assessments, as these help to identify people who experience the greatest health needs, those who face barriers to accessing services and who are potentially most impacted by any service improvements or changes. We collect equality data to enable us to review who we have heard from, what they told us in order to help inform any improvements we may need to make and to encourage and promote the involvement of people who are reflective of the Bromley population. It is critical that we continue to reach and develop relationships with diverse communities, especially those who are seldom heard. This entails proactively planning our involvement, identifying resources and sources of support to enable us to do this. In Bromley, we work through our voluntary sector organisations to help us reach a range of different communities.

We also proactively seek out groups who have poorer health outcomes and experiences to understand how improvements can be made. We do this through:

Providing information about what we are doing in Bromley and how to get involved in a variety of different formats. This can include written information, support groups, using systems used by partners (such as the voluntary sector) to reach particular communities.

Focusing our work on reaching particular communities – such as young people, those with learning disabilities, older people and people who suffer poorer health outcomes. For example in 2019, we have commissioned Your Voice in Health and Social Care to proactively engage with women who are more disadvantaged and have poorer health outcomes from having a baby to help strengthen maternity services.

Involving patients to help narrow the gap in health inequalities. You can read more about the impact of involving people from different communities and how this is helping to lead to a narrowing in health inequalities in our Annual Engagement Report.

The CCG was chosen as a pilot site by NHS Right Care and NHS England to identify a number of healthcare areas where there are potential opportunities for addressing equality and tackling health inequalities. The report that was provided was considered by our Equality and Diversity Group and the intelligence it provides is used to inform development of Equality Impact Assessments for various programmes. The report identified that people living in a number of areas of Bromley had higher rates of emergency hospital admissions due to respiratory conditions. We used this information in our keep well over winter campaign. Leaflets, providing clear information on how to keep well over winter and get protected from the flu were posted to homes in those target areas.

The right care pack has had a positive influence on Clinical training in Bromley. The information supplied has enabled us to host targeted training sessions within the areas we would like to improve. Bromley unplanned hospitalisations for asthma were high across the borough, this was discussed with Bromley’s Lead Practice Nurse and a session was run for all Primary Care Nurses around prevention and managing respiratory conditions. Other sessions are also being planned with Bromley GPs and helping them to build a practice area profile, this information has led to a better understanding of each ICNs demographic and the training required to improve on current figures.

Some examples of engagement include:

Improving health for people with learning disabilities - Doctors in Bromley are encouraging people with learning disabilities to make sure they have their annual health check with their GP. The check helps to keep them well and pick up any problems at an early stage. In Bromley only half of those entitled to the check are actually having one. Through this engagement we want to understand what is preventing people from having a check and what we can put in place to make it easier to have one.

Primary Care Needs Assessment – to understand what local people need from their GP services, we went to a variety of local groups that support people who we seldom hear from. This included those with learning disabilities, BME communities etc.

Over the counter prescribing proposals – We engaged the public on our plans to no longer support the routine prescribing of over the counter medicines. This included proactively identifying and reaching communities more likely to be impacted such as those on lower incomes and the elderly.

Co-producing children's services - We have been working with young people and partners across Bromley to co-produce improvements to emotional and mental wellbeing for children and young people in Bromley. We plan to produce a robust and sustainable system of support and treatment that improves the emotional wellbeing and mental health of the population as a whole and provides evidence based services. We have reached young people in a variety of ways through schools, home schooling service, homelessness support group, after school clubs, young carers and children with communication difficulties.

Planned orthopaedic elective care - we asked local people for their views on proposals for a two site option for planned orthopaedic elective care in south east London. We commissioned Healthwatch Bromley to speak to groups who are seldom heard.

Whose Shoes for maternity care - We commissioned a whose shoes event on maternity care which was run by our Maternity Voices Partnership. This has led to improvements in maternity care in Bromley and has informed a work plan for our Maternity Voices Partnership.

Phlebotomy – We spoke to groups supporting people with HIV.

Audiology - We worked with patient representatives and Bromley Deaf Access group to inform the service redesign of community audiology services. Their input lead to an improved service.

Mental Health Services – We asked for feedback on the psychological therapies service and mental health employment services. The outcomes of this engagement led to improvements in the current service at that time and the commissioning of the Bromley Recovery Works service.